Synopsis: In an isolated region of Kyushu lies the town of Suiten. Though seeming small and modest, Suiten is not a picturesque place for a vacation, unless it is from the "Unseen World." Taro, Makoto, and Masayuki, three boys with traumatic pasts, learn to let their souls cross between the two parallel worlds. However, the Unseen World is no mere copy of the real Apparent World. The Unseen World is the home of ghosts, but changes are now allowing the souls of the dead to pass over into the Apparent World, with unpredictable effects. Follow the journey of Taro, Makoto, and Masayuki, as they cross between the two worlds, trying to unravel a great mystery.

Note: This is not a recent review.

My Rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

Title: Ghost Hound, Shinreigari

Episodes: 22

Genre(s): Sci-Fi, Supernatural, Psychological

Air Date: October 18, 2007—April 4, 2008

Producers: Production I.G, WOWOW, Pony Canyon, Sentai Filmworks, Showgate

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Made in 2007, it's one of those borderline anime that are trying out the new animation style, but still have the bland colors of older styles. Nonetheless, it was still good, and honestly I'm not complaining. I like that animation style. In the beginning, a lot of the camera angles of the show were pretty impressive. Those behind the production tried a fair amount to make the scenery almost lifelike...almost being the key word. It was impressive, slightly. Though with every episode progression, it felt as though the animation was getting pretty lazy (at least with the scenery aspect), and it was no longer as impressive (it was only impressive to an extent to begin with).

There's so much I could say about this anime that are spoilers, which because these spoilers are what I feel I should reveal in order to get someone interested. Basically, these three kids form a friendship through a mutual bond of having traumatic experiences that occurred in their past. They also share a mutual interest in a past event that occurred in the small town of Suiten, which is actually shown in the first episode to be Taro's (one of the main characters) traumatic experiences. He was kidnapped as a young child with his sister, and his sister died. Now he has repressed memories of the even that haunt him. The further the three main characters - Taro, Makoto, and Masayuki - explore into the kidnapping, the more they get mixed up in some supernatural occurrences, which all seemingly tie into their pasts, going on around the town which apparently is located on some sort of spirit world hot spot. Almost everything that occurs in this anime has to do with Taro's traumatic experience in some way, which serves as a premise to the entire show (and is revealed in the first episode) because everyone seems to be strangely knowledgeable on the topic.

So...I think there was character development? But I didn't notice it much. Taro, Makoto, & Masayuki were all likable throughout the entire series (though I didn't like Masayuki much at the start because he seemed like some creepy teenage stalker), and they did have some development. But for some reason I've got it in my head that there needs to be a progressive, noticeable change in the character to be considered "development"...which I know isn't the case. You do see Taro become more confident in himself through the series, and Makoto become less angry at the world. Masayuki is still slightly creepy stalker-ish. The humor in the show was limited...I know 14-16 year olds are boring but I am pretty sure most have a better sense of humor than those characters. Sometimes the show would get too heavy, so there'd be a few random friendship-buddy-buddy moments to lighten the mood - which isn't bad, it just seemed awkwardly placed.

Being that this anime is a thriller/horror/supernatural drama, there wasn't anything special about the sound effects throughout the anime. The only thing I have to say is none of the "creepy", "mysteries", or "scary" moments would have been very climatic without the stupid typical horror sounds you find in shows and movies. And the more the show progressed, the more these moments decreased - which kinda sucked because even if it was cheesy I was enjoying watching it at 2am in the dark wired on a Monster Energy drink yelling "ohhhh my god!" despite there not being any "oh my god" worthy moments I just didn't want ghostly possessions to occur and turn someone I liked evil. The opening and ending themes were both good. At least, to an extent. I'm not fond of slow songs so the ending was just "meh" to me, though I did like it when in the mood. For some reason I found myself listening to the opening for majority of the series. It was a nice song, though that's my opinion.

I enjoyed this show. Sort of. I mean, I did. I enjoyed watching it. But I didn't like the ending at all - it was a flop. Honestly, the show was very technical. It's really heavy on the psychological terms and often can become more of a test of knowledge while watching it. Most of the terms are common knowledge, however, so it's not too difficult to keep up. But it is, at times, an exercise of the brain. I won't say much on why I don't enjoy the ending, but basically as the story progressed the problem of the plot losing focus arose. The show gives you this main focus for the storyline in the beginning: Taro's kidnapping. But it wasn't long before the storyline split into three, with other problems popping up. These problems, in a way, are all connected to the kidnapping of Taro. Which was great, until I came to a realization as I got further along that the resolution wasn't going to be what I was hoping. You don't get a solid ending. You kind of get a few answers, and everything else is brushed aside...then yay, happy ending scene with all the main characters smiling!

I still recommend it, though. It was pretty unique and a curiously interesting anime.